THE LANGUAGE OF SALES

Little girls ready for the Halloween party

I sign up for email promotions from those online retailers from which I purchase. If I didn’t, I’m afraid I would forget all about them. So, everyday my inbox is filled with sales promotions with the expectation that I, and other shoppers, will be drawn in:

·      Hurry! Your deal expires soon. (Trust me, if it ends, it will be back. They always want to sell me something.)

·      Last chance (Fat chance! There will always be another deal.)

·      Final hours

·      Get it before its gone! (Okay. It might be gone.)

·      Your 10% (or 15% coupon) ends soon. (Are you kidding? I might pay attention at 25%.)

·      Free shipping / free gift / save 20% (And then you open the website to discover this deal only applies when you spend a certain amount, like $69, $85, or $150, carefully calculated so that you won’t reach that amount with just the item you have in mind.)

·      Buy one, get one -- and variations thereof. (This is my least favorite promotion. When you only want one, as is often the case, this is a useless deal whereby they lose my purchase altogether.)  

·      Today Only! (Give me a break. There’s always tomorrow.)

·      Here’s your $10 bonus (which upon ordering, doesn’t seem to mean very much in the total)

·      This weekend only – $4.99 (original price: $5.99)

·      Or, they invite you to the clearance sale, and everything you might want is no longer available. Penney’s and Blair are big offenders.

·      And then we have seasonal sales, such as “Spooky Good Deals,” “No Tricks, Just Treats,” or “Monster Sale.”

Sometimes I get sucked in, but my goal is not to add more fabric and yarn to my stash without a definite purpose. (Notice that I am enticed by fabric and yarn, not clothes and home dec. Sometimes I have to be stern with myself. “You’re shopping,” I say, “and you don’t need a thing!” True but not much fun.

I used to think that I should never shop JoAnn’s without a discount coupon. If I got to the store without a coupon, I just didn’t go in. Then I realized that for the little I actually spend plus the fact that the coupon doesn’t apply to sale merchandise anyway, I really don’t need to bother with coupons. These days I seldom present a coupon, and they never ask for one. KW

HAPPY HALLOWEEN!!